Pleasure-railway structure



UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JOHNVA. MILLER, or nomnwoon, ILLIN'oIs, v

PLEASURE-RAILWAY srrnnc'rnnn.

To all whom it may concern .Be it known that I, JOHN A. MILLER, acitizen of the United States, and a resident of Homewood, in the countyof Cook, State of Illinois, have invented certain new and usefulImprovements in Pleasure-Railway Structures, of which the following is aspecification.

My invention relates to pleasure railway structures in which thetrackway has sudden and steep lateral and vertical curves, and and theprincipal object of my invention is to provide improved track and earconstruction which will insure retention of the car on the track at alltimes to thus make the structure entirely safe. The structure disclosedin my Patent No. 1,319,888 granted October 28th, 1919, was designed fornew equipment. In the older structure disclosed in my Patent No.1,037,958 granted Sep tember 10th, 1912, no provision is made forguarding against abrupt vertical curves and the object of my inventionis to provide for making such old structures safe. This I preferablyaccomplish by adding top plates on the guard beams and providing guardrollers on the ends of the shafts of the vehicle wheels, which rollerstrack on the under side of the top plate to hold the car againstvertical displacement from the rails.

My improved structure is clearly shown on the accompanying drawing inwhich- Figure 1 is a vertical sectional view of a track structure and acar thereon and Fig. 2 is an enlarged sectional view of one corner ofthe structure.

On the drawing the rail structures 5 and 6 are supported on cross ties 7which are carried by the trellis 8 resting on the ground, the railmembers being given the desired lateral and vertical curvature. Runningalongside of the rail members and also secured to the cross ties are theguard beams 9. I C represents a car. This car comprises the side beams10, the cross beams 11, the fioor 12 and the seat structure 13. Bearingframes 14; are secured to the side beams and receive the shafts 15 bymeans of which the vehicle wheels 16 are pivoted. Running boards 17 aresecured on top of the side beams 10 and extend outwardly over theSpecification of Letters Patent; i i Patented A Application filedNovember 6, 1920. Serial No. 422,115.

Secured against the under side of the floor structure of the car are thejournal boxes or frames 19 which journal the horizontally disposed guardrollers 20 which engage against the facing plate 21 forming part of therail structure. These horizontal guard rollers'limit the lateraldisplacement of the cars while traveling over the track structure.

Where the vertical grades are steep and the cars travel at great speed,provision should be made to guard against vertical displacement of thecars and against any danger of their leaving the rails. In accordancewith my invention I secure guard bars 22 on top of the guard beams 9 andthese bars may be secured by the same bolts which secure the guard beamsto the ties. The bars overhang the inner sides of the guard beams asufficient distance to form rail surfaces for the guard rollers 23 whichare journaled on the shafts of the vehicle wheels. These guard rollersmay be held on the shafts by the heads 24 provided on the shafts asshown, or other suitable means may be provided. It is evident thatinstead of using the individual short shaft lengths for the vehiclewheels as shown a common shaft could be provided for each set of wheelsand the guard rollers 23 journaled on the ends thereof.

By adding the guard bars or rails 22 to the track structure and byproviding the guard rollers 23 on the cars, a construction otherwiseunsafe for abrupt high speed vertlcal curves is made absolutely safe.The guard rollers prevent vertical displacement of the vehicle wheelsbeyond a certain operating clearance while the horizontal guard rollers20 limit the lateral play of the car and sudden vertical or lateralcurves can be taken at high speed without danger of the car leaving therails.

Having described my invention, I claim as follows:

In pleasure railway structures of the 100 class described, thecombination of supporting frame work, rail structures mounted thereon, avehicle, vehicle wheels and supporting axles therefor, said vehiclewheels engaging with the top sides of said rail 105 structures,horizontal guard rollers journaled from the underside of said vehicle inposition to engage with the inner sides of said rail structures tothereby limit the lateral movement of said vehicle while travel- 110ring over said rail structures, guard rollers ment of said Vehicle isconfined tov prevent journaled 0n the ends of said axles, supsaidvehicle from leaving the rail structures. porting uprights along sidethe rail struc- In Witness whereof, I hereunto subscribe 10 tures, andguard rails'securedbnsaid up-" my name this lst'day of November, A. D.

5 rights in position to be engaged. on their 1920.

undersides by said guard rollers on the ve-' 1 hicle axles whereby thevertical displace- JOHN A. MILLER.

